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Stupid People

Washington's Permanent Campaign

You People Are Stupid

Everything conservative politicians do and say fairly screams, “We know you people are idiots and easily manipulated through your ignorance and emotions.” Their argument is almost always emotional, visceral, stirring up anger and malice. Their only positive messaging involves a positive attitude contrasting negative behavior: pro America meaning anti-immigrant, anti-black, anti-gay. The overwhelming majority of what conservative political organizations do is propaganda (to be absolutely fair: at least half of what liberals do is propaganda as well). The subtext of virtually all of it is You People Are Stupid, You People Are Children: Easily Manipulated And Led By Your Emotions Instead of Your Intellect.” That may as well be their campaign theme. Why does this strategy work? Because the people they are talking to are too stupid to realize they’re being insulted. These are, in every demonstrable way, just as stupid as the GOP leadership (and Sarah Palin, who’s become rich exploiting Silly and Stupid Conservative Soccer Moms) obviously think they are. They will believe any lie, no matter how preposterous, and believe absolutely anything, anything at all, about Barack Obama; the more utterly ridiculous the better.

These people are grossly underinformed and deliberately misinformed by lunatics like Pat Robertson and Glen Beck and patently obvious phonies like Rush Limbaugh, all of whom make millions upon millions exploiting these ignorant, superstitious people clinging to their guns and religion and cloistered in tribal enclaves where intellectual curiosity is not encouraged and logic is routinely subverted by a veil of ignorance which enforces culture over reason. Politicians understand this and know how to work these people—including you and I—by appealing not to our intellect but to our emotion. Conservatives, specifically and most demonstrably, encourage negative emotions—mainly fear—in order to stoke hatred and anger because hatred and anger, motivated by deep-seated fear, is the equation for getting people off of the sofa. Hope and change never motivated anybody. People voted for Obama not out of hope but out of fear of Gidget and Grampa; of even the slightest possibility of a Sarah Palin presidency. Positive emotion does not motivate stupid people, and stupid people outnumber the rest by at least 4-1. Politics is the art of motivating Stupid People. The way to motivate Stupid People is to make them afraid. Their fear will manifest itself as anger and resentment, and that will provide the ballast to lift their fat, racist, ignorant butts off the sofa and get them into the streets yelling and screaming and, presumably, to the polls.

And so, rather than governing, rather than doing their jobs and accomplishing any good whatsoever for the American people, Republicans (in specific) have cemented a tragic pattern of obstruction; of effectively halting the wheels of progress in Washington in an effort to keep the yelling and screaming going. The Republicans, in specific, have adopted a permanent campaign, an abject refusal to accept the legitimate vote of the American people. And Stupid People keep these evil men and women in power. Why? Because even Stupider People vote for Obama and then go to sleep, when voting for Obama is only half the job. The other half is giving the president a Congress actually willing to accomplish something. Stupid People do not understand this. Stupid Conservative People do not understand that life has to be about more than just beating Obama. The roads need fixing. Schools need funding. Things need to get done in America. But they don’t care. Beating Obama—to whom they’ve lost twice—is all they care about, no matter how much damage is done, no matter who loses their home or their job or what happens to their kid’s school. Stupid People keep reelecting these Congressional Corpses to obstruct all legislation, and then blame the president because they’ve lost their job or their home or because their kid’s school is horrible. Stupid People support NOT expanding criminal and mental illness background checks for gun purchasers. And Stupid People win, every time. Why? Because they outnumber everyone else at least 4-1, and because logic, hope and reason are not strong enough motivators to get thoughtful people to take action. Which, to my point, makes educated, thoughtful, folks Even Stupider People because Even Stupider People are the ones sitting out the midterm elections and, therefore, letting Stupid People run the country.

No "There" There: Republicans like Lindsey Graham are not nearly as concerned about the tragic loss of life in Benghazi as they are about blaming Obama for it. Benghazi is, for them, only the latest excuse to avoid governing.

In Magog We Trust

It really irritates me when Stupid People repeatedly involve the name of Jesus Christ as their motivator and guide, as if ignorance and superstition are somehow qualities of God. Jesus was not the God Of Stupid People. Nothing, write this down someplace, nothing of the evil, lying, racist, hateful nonsense these Stupid People do is in any way related to the personal example of Jesus Christ. These people demonstrably do not know Jesus Christ, no matter what their idiotic blathering says. Jesus was apolitical. He carried no gun. He owned nothing but the robes on His back. He marched in no rallies. He did not organize politically. Jesus’ ministry bares absolutely no resemblance to the freak show going on in conservative politics. These Stupid People really need to stop telling that lie, that they are “Christians,” motivated by their love of Jesus. They clearly do not know and have no relationship whatsoever with the risen Savior. God is not the author of ignorance. God is not divided within Himself.

I suspect I am a closet Republican. I believe in smaller government, lower taxes, and strongly defended individual freedom. I’m in the closet about it because the Republican party, once home to progressive thinkers like Abraham Lincoln, has been co-opted by the hysterical fringe—composed mostly of bible-pumping, gun-toting racists. I am certainly not one of those, not part of the belching, anti-intellectual reactionary crowd the GOP now routinely panders to and has come to symbolize. I am likely an all but extinct minority: the liberal Republican. Abraham Lincoln was a liberal Republican. I am less a George W. Bush Republican than possibly a Jeb Bush Republican. If you’re twisting your face right now at just the mention of the former Florida Governor’s name, let me ask you: have you ever heard Jeb Bush speak? Have you read his book or any of his speeches? Or are you just reacting emotionally to the name “Bush,” and assuming one Bush is just like the other.

Such emotional reactions is precisely what is wrong in today’s political process. Presuming something about Jeb Bush based on our conclusions about his brother is as cripplingly immature as fringe conservatives’ disproportionate and histrionic hatred of President Obama; although I remain convinced Obama Hatred has at its roots the color of the president’s skin and not, as the lunatic fringe transparently exclaim, his policies. Blacks tend to react to “Bush” because of the 43rd president’s policies. Conservative whites hated Obama on spec, before the shampoo in the Oval Office carpet had even dried.

This is what children do—jump to conclusions and blurt out every unexpressed thought as it pops into their heads. 90% of what I see in politics today, on either ideological side, is the work of two-year olds. It’s all emotion over intellect, intended to stoke anger and resentment and get us all riled up. Why? Because politicians know the only way to get us off the sofa and down to the polls is to get us angry enough to overcome our laziness.

The entirety of last week was about “scandals” exploding at the White House, Fox News and conservative pit bulls like Rush Limbaugh having a feeding frenzy on one manufactured “scandal” after another. Only, when you turn off the yelling and histrionics and actually read these documents as they are released, you realize there really was no scandal at all. So-called “pastor” and former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee soberly predicted that the president would inevitably have to resign or be impeached in the wake of the Benghazi “scandal.” But then the White House re-released original emails exchanged in the wake of the Benghazi tragedy which reinforced U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice’s original statement, that she was using talking points edited by the CIA. At this writing, there have been no apologies extended to Ambassador Rice.

Last week, the president faced the IRS “scandal,” and remains accused of using the IRS to target his political enemies, which is also utter nonsense. I am amazed none of the pundits have pointed out that the agency had good reason to look closely at right-wing reactionary groups applying for non-profit status on the transparently false basis of their being non-political. Reactionary right-wing groups have historically been responsible for fostering hatred and inspiring violence in this country. They accuse the IRS of giving liberal groups “a free pass” while missing the point that liberal groups rarely speak openly about assassinating the president or overthrowing the government. I’ve never seen liberal activists bring loaded weapons to a rally. Given the violent language employed by many conservative groups, added scrutiny into these “patriotic” fringe organizations is, in my opinion, certainly warranted.

Republicans, most especially, have no interest in governing. This was made all the more evident in a memo sent last week urging Republican senators and Congressmen to remain focused on the “Obama scandals” and not change their focus to, say, actual governing. The GOP mission, for four and half years now, has been solely to block any progress the president may make. Why? So they can win elections. Winning elections is absolutely the only thing these people care about. They are completely indifferent to the well-being of the American people and have no interest in negotiation or compromise. These evil Old Rich White Men have grossly distorted and perverted the very concept of America by promoting fear and hatred and blocking, ad homenim, any and all progress in government in service of a political goal. And Stupid People keep sending these evil Old Rich White Men, time after time after time, back to Washington.

I Heard About It On The News: Jon Stewart takes a poke at Obama.

A Meeting of The Minds

Compromise is the entire point of representative government. These people are on a permanent campaign, not even honoring the traditional eighteen-month window between major elections in which to compromise and move legislation through Congress. They refuse to stop campaigning, plotting, working their schemes. The behavior is pathological. But we really cannot blame these evil Old Rich White Men and women: we have to blame ourselves for keeping these people in power.

The midterm elections are where these lunatics live. I have no idea what it will take to make youth and minority voters understand that simple fact. Youth and minority voters are traditionally absent from the midterm elections. They rally around someone like Barack Obama, and, two years later, you can’t convince them to get off the sofa because it’s not a presidential election, it’s just about Congressmen and Senators. But, hey, STUPID, the people causing all of this destruction, who likely cost you your job in the idiotic sequester insanity, are Congressmen and Senators, most of whom are elected during the midterms. Voting for Obama means absolutely nothing if you don’t provide him a cooperative legislature, a group of *reasonable* people willing to move things through Congress. But this isn’t what we do. Why? Because we’re Stupid People. We don’t know much about how any of this works. We voted in Obama. High five. Now back to the couch.

Who does show up at the midterm elections? Old white people. Not exclusively, but the majority of voters in the midterms are older white voters, who tend to vote Republican and conservative, and who think lunatics like John Boehner and Mitch McConnell are doing a good job. I dare the Associated Press or major news network to poll midterms voters and ask them how many black friends they have. Meanwhile, we do nothing. We lie on the couch. We can’t be bothered. We have no idea who our senator is and we don’t care. We voted in Obama. High five.

Christopher J. Priest
19 May 2013
editor@praisenet.org
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